Bad costumer service

Hello,

I want to talk about the costumer service here on shapeways. I don't know who does the communication with costumers but there is clearly something wrong with the knowledge and involvement in printing with those people.

I ordered a model in brass with a polished finish and it should have arrive on the 23th of march. I got a message on the 24th saying that the model was deformed because of the polishing and this person asked me if this was acceptable (the model has a very open structure which can easily deform). If I wanted the model reprinted I had to wait another 11 days, even though he said the model was put in front of the queue.

This should all be straight lines and perfect rectangles

How in the world does the person, who handles 100s of models each day, not know that my model will deform when polished?! This is something very obvious if you are a professional in this field. So now I have to wait another 11 days, and that is on top of the fact that they were late already, it was not even shipped!

I asked if it could be placed in front of the queue since it was their fault in making the decision to polish it, which is know to deform models. But the person I talked to said the 11 days was already the front of the queue. I find that very strange as the total time it takes to order a model is 12 days for everyone who orders a new print. This person is just plain lying to me! I don't know if this is daily business at Shapeways but I'm not fond of it! Costumer service also told me in that there was no way to know that the model would deform, but in earlier e-mails he told me this is a normal thing to happen to steel prints. So again this person is lying to me to save his own skin, or at lease it does look very much like it.

I am really not happy with the way this is going and I have asked to reprint the model but I am not confident that i will receive a good print with someone at the wheel who has really no idea what he is talking about.

I want to at least tell this incident on the forum because I don't know it this is normal at shapeways but if it isn't this should be said.

You may want to reread your own writing. "Steel" is a completely different production process than "brass" so if anything Nisey saved you from more disappointment by pointing out perils of the (sintered, machine-polished) steel process. (And I guess it should be clear that the people in customer service are not normally the same ones who do the printing and polishing).
11 days is already one day less than their advertised turnaround time for small brass parts, and as far as I know these are cast in batches (and by a production partner), so you cannot expect a single run in record time.
If it now seems obvious to you that the part will deform easily and bending it back in shape is not an option, perhaps order it in "raw brass" and try your own hand at polishing , or change the design to make it more robust ?

This is the look and feel section of the Brass page


So, if your piece were meant to be jewelry, it very well could have been acceptable in a slightly deformed state. Functional parts should be ordered in raw brass. Our production partners do not assess the intent of every design. 12 days is the ship on time, not the delivery time, meaning your part was only a day late. Following the guidelines, you should have ordered in raw brass to receive a functional part, with a 10 day ship in time.

I predict that you will never receive a part from this design with "straight lines and perfect rectangles". Metal shrinks and warps unevenly during casting, and the thinner and more unsupported it is, the more it does. This design seems made to highlight that issue, and I don't think it is realistic to expect it to succeed with exact geometry using any casting process. (I wouldn't give a pin for its chances in steel either -- unsupported squares in that material warp during printing.)

I think the deformation in your photo occurred during printing and casting, not during polishing. So while I don't agree with the customer service person's analysis, I also don't think you'll get a better part by complaining. It needs a redesign.

Hey TokTok,

Thanks for sharing. Our goal is to give you the best quality part possible and this a good question. To confirm everyone, this is in our Steel material family and while warping could have happened at a few steps in the process, it was QA'd after polishing. There have been cases where parts were bent in the the tumbler so it seems mostly to have occurred there.

As you requested, the part is being reprinted and you'll have it in hand as quickly as possible, which is likely 11 business days due to the holiday weekend.

I thought that photo looked like steel. I have printed many squares in steel and I have many warped squares...I wish you luck with this, and I don't think it will be Shapeways' fault if it doesn't work, and I don't think it will work.

The material is steel with a bronze coating. I'm not sure who this is printed but don't think they are casting stainless steel. The website says its going through an infusion process. In any case this is confusing to me because the person from CS spoke about steel and then bronze. Looking at the website the material is clearly steel with infused with bronze.

It is clear to me that the people who do the printing are not the people who do costumer service but the people at CS should be able te speak on behalf of the people who handle printing.

The thing that bothers me to most is that this all could have been prevented. If I had been mailed about this before polishing the model with a warning that warping would occur I would have chosen not to polish it. Instead this was done the other way around.

I don't think so either but at the very least I'm spilling the issue here and CS may be improved a bit. If problems like this will go unnoticed they will never improve.

As noted I don't think this is a polishing issue. Steel parts are typically either unaffected or shattered by tumble polishing; any warping that takes place will have occurred during the printing process. In my experience this type of part -- relying on thin straight bars and perfect right angles for its visual impact -- is poorly suited to production in metal by 3D printing. All of mine that looked like this, I have abandoned or redesigned.

Well then there is no point in reprinting the part at all. Again, this is because of the person I talked to apparently wasn't involved enough to know these things. If the model comes in warped then it's a waste of money and time. Instead I would probably have chosen for casting in bronze or brass.

I also contacted another company who lasersinters metal parts. This is used for dental work and is very precise. According to them they can compete with shapeways in price and print complex structures. We'll see what they come up with.

... the result might be just the technology of the stainless steel printing used by Shapeways and I´m afraid,
this technology doesn´t changes next couple of years.
The used technology is nice price for common customers.
If You want to pay + 500% You could ask other companies using direct laser. ( I.e Laser metal deposition welding )
https://www.extremetech.com/extreme/143552-3d-printing-with-m etal-the-final-frontier-of-additive-manufacturing

SS material printing on Shapeways:
The only chance is, to learn of the results.
Sometimes You have to say "no,- it won´t be printable... sometimes You have to change the design to get acceptable results.

I´m learning of the results too:
https://www.shapeways.com/forum/index.php?t=msg&goto=1327 74&&srch=usb#msg_132774

Would be interesting to learn how the SLM provided by the dental company compares to shapeways' aluminum (+/- 0.2mm for small parts or +/- 1.5 percent on parts over 10mm in length). Depending on the precision you need (i.e., is this mondrian-style jewelry or a functional part), conventional milling could be the best if not novel solution.

> Again, this is because of the person I talked to apparently wasn't involved enough to know these things.

To see this problem coming, you need to have had the specific experience of trying to print thin struts at right angles. Not many people have.

> Instead I would probably have chosen for casting in bronze or brass.

As noted, I doubt you would see a better result with casting. It's a difficult part.

> I also contacted another company who lasersinters metal parts. This is used for dental work and is very precise. According to them they can
> compete with shapeways in price and print complex structures. We'll see what they come up with.

Laser sintering may work better for this design. Steel printing is great at what it's great at: one of many processes with different strengths, none of which solves all problems.

I was thinking the same thing. But this is a quick test and going to a company who does milling will take a lot of time and probably a lot of money. So printing was the easiest en cheapest way.

I take it that the company who does these prints knows what they are doing. But I guess that shapeways focuses on jewelry and such, so precision is not needed.

As far as I know, shapeways' steel parts are manufactured by the company that invented and builds the printers for the process. Shapeways however is careful to add a disclaimer to each of their materials pages which states that prints are suitable for decorative purposes only.

That's become clear to me now...